Sunday, October 16, 2016

Our Innate Misanthropy

The pleasure that we feel in Satire, in satiric comedy, in raillerie [banter], in gossip, etc., in either speaking it or hearing it, comes purely from the feeling or the conviction of superiority to others which is roused in us by those things, that is, in short, by our innate hatred of others, a consequence of self-love that causes us to take pleasure in the humiliation and debasement even of those who are in no way opposed or can be opposed to our self-love, our interests, etc., who have never harmed us, displeased us, brought us discomfort—and even of the human species itself, the humiliation of which, as it is mocked in comedies or satires, etc., in the abstract, and without specificity of real individuals, itself flatters our innate misanthropy. And I say innate because self-love, which is innate, cannot exist without it.